Dear rss free blog,
Should
you be thinking of making a donation to assist the Haiti earthquake
relief effort, I want to suggest doing it through an organization
called Partners in Health (www.pih.org).
I just did. While headquartered in Boston, the principals of the organization
have been providing medical care and public health services in Haiti
for over 25 years. They were notably featured in the book Mountains
Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure
the World.
Alternatively,
you can mail a check to: Partners in Health, P.O. Box 845578, Boston
MA 02284-5578.
After the
Red Cross collected funds it could not spend on victims after 9/11,
it remodeled its office and installed air-conditioning, which is why
I look for alternative charities.
Last
summer in South Africa, my eldest grandchild, Claude, decided
that what he would like to be a taxi van announcer, leaning out of
the window of the packed vehicle to shout its destination. With a
fake Afrikaans accent, he like to yell from the rented
van “Rondebosch”, the name of the suburb we were staying in.
Today
Bloomberg has an article about a perfect investment for
Claude: SA Taxi Finance, SATF, provider of funding to South
Africa’s minibus taxis, will begin selling bonds by the middle of
next year to boost capital available for loans. I am not sure we can buy the new bonds but I want to if possible.
SATF plans
to issue 3 to 7 year debt, said CEO Martin Bezuidenhout. Market
conditions will determine yields and how much will be sold. “We
plan to move into the corporate bond space within the next eighteen
months,” said Bezuidenhout. “We want to boost our client base.”
Most South Africans, over 79% of the 50 mn population,
depend on minibuses for transport, a legacy of apartheid which drove
non-whites out of city centers. Minibus taxis, operating informally,
are often poorly maintained because their owners cannot access the
capital needed for improvements.
SATF plans bond sales to
raise its capital under management almost sixfold to 16 bn rand
($2.14 bn) by 2014, Bezuidenhout said. That will help it boost its
client base of 20,000 to 5 times as many vans. SATF until now raised
capital via more expensive private bond placements with South
African banks.
Moody’s Investors Service today assigned a
Service Quality rating of SQ3 to SATF, the third-highest rating. The
Service Quality rating evaluates the capacity of companies to
administer the assets under their management as well as their ability
to prevent defaults and enforce payments in case of delinquency,
according to Bezuidenhout. “The rating is part of the process of
benchmarking the quality of our operations and is the first step
toward moving into the corporate bond space,” the CEO told
Bloomberg.
SATF is currently in talks with “overseas
financiers” about possibly placing instruments with foreign
investors, he added.
*Almost every foreign bank you ever
heard of will probably be subject to the Obama administration’s
proposed 0.15% tax on liabilities if Congress approves. Almost all
have US operations which will be enough to subject them to the levy,
called a “financial crisis responsibility fee.” Details will come
later today.
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